Avoid a Weightloss Plateau

While there are some things little things here and there that can be done to increase your resting metabolism by a small amount (i.e., staying hydrated, eating smaller meals more frequently, etc), the bulk of one’s metabolism is directly related to the amount of muscle mass and the amount of fat mass in the body.


Most men have a higher metabolism than women (which is why they can eat a bag of chips and not gain weight, and we eat a handful and put on a few pounds) because the average man has significantly more muscle than the average woman. On the other hand, an obese woman who weighs 75 pounds more than a healthy woman would most likely have a higher metabolism because the body expends energy maintaining fat as well.

So if you’ve been losing weight (yay!), your resting metabolic rate is going to go down along with it because your body doesn’t need to use the extra energy to maintain that fat you lost. So, eventually, you will stop losing weight even though you continue to eat and exercise the same (boo!). You may need to eat even less or start exercising even more to continue losing weight and avoid hitting a weight loss plateau. Also, let’s say you weighed 150 pounds for several years and did not gain or lose weight, and then started eating less /exercising more and lose weight. You won’t be able to go back to eating the way you did at 150 pounds without gaining weight due to your decreased metabolism.

One thing people say often is that they have either a “fast” metabolism or a “slow” metabolism. Actually, The American Journal Of Clinical Nutrition reported that in a study of identical twins, baseline metabolism is somewhat set at birth. For those born with a slower baseline metabolism, it will be harder to lose weight (but not impossible!) because they will not burn as many calories when not exercising. But even someone with a slow resting metabolism will be able to lose weight if they exercise more and burn more calories ‘actively’.